The wave-mixing near field optics amplifier: a theoretical feasibility study for non-linear NFO experiments in biology, chemistry and materials science

Although the advance of near field optics gives us the ability to achieve sub-wavelength resolution in microscopy, so far its application to chemistry and biology has been mostly limited to fluorescence imaging. In this study we propose a new method, namely using the non-linear near field optics properties to study the material interactions directly, by wave-mixing the near field and the external pumping field. Using this method, one can study the rich non-linear spectroscopic properties of many systems with the added bonus of near field resolution.